Magical Expeditions

Taking 11 days off from work turned out to be not as easy as I had imagined. But as they say where there is a will, there is a way and buddy there is a lot of will here. Hence, the last couple of days have been quite hectic at work. I want to ensure that I meet all my deadlines before I leave for Egypt for a hassle free vacation. As the days go by in a haze of work and travel preparation I find myself thrilling at every little detail that I have to plan. There is a spiffy little travel agent in me who loves all the little details of a vacation… who just goofed up!

So I was booking flight tickets from Bangalore to Mumbai and back, and I mis-spelt Arjun’s name. It reads “Arjum Manjunath” instead of “Arjun Manjunath” . A typo! No big deal I thought. I can easily get the spelling of the name corrected. Hah, I was in for a surprise! I have called MakeMyTrip and I have called Inidgo and there only solution is to cancel the ticket, rebook it and of course pay cancellation fees! How much of a difference does a mistyped alphabet make? In India, customer service is just lip service. Not once did the lady at Indigo mention that a typo is ignored at the time of check-in. Her aim was not to help me but to fleece me.

Travel agents do typos all the time! I have traveled abroad on a ticket where my surname and first names were swapped. My friends have similar stories to tell. But still when you call customer service all you get to hear is “Sorry ma’m, we can’t help you!”. Frustrating to say the least.

This post was supposed to be about my travel itinerary in Egypt instead it turned into a minor rant about airlines. Next post on places I am going to see in Egypt and how I decided on them!

Update:

1. Air Deccan was quite helpful. They told me that they can’t change the name but will put a comment next to our PNR number ensuring that we don’t have any problems while boarding our flight from Mumbai back to Bangalore.
2. Using Air Deccan’s good service example, I called up Indigo again and this time got the number to Indigo check-in counter at the Bangalore airport. The lady at the check-in counter told me that she will make a comment about it on our tickets which will lead to hassle free boarding. Phew!